


"Yes, I Know, But What Happened Next?"

by BangAndBlame_Archivist



Category: Blake's 7
Genre: Gen, Meta, Post-Gauda Prime
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2003-03-14
Updated: 2003-03-14
Packaged: 2018-12-20 02:49:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11911641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BangAndBlame_Archivist/pseuds/BangAndBlame_Archivist
Summary: by AnnaSGauda Prime meta





	"Yes, I Know, But What Happened Next?"

**Author's Note:**

> Note from oracne, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Bang and Blame](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Bang_and_Blame), a Blake’s 7 archive, which has been offline for several years. To keep the works available for readers and scholars, we began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project after June 2017. We posted announcements about the move, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on the [Bang and Blame collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/BangAndBlame/profile).

At the point I write this, I'm a relatively new Blake's 7 fan and a very new fanfic writer.

I first watched B7 at the beginning of 1998, when a friend at work lent me her videos. "You have to watch this," she said in rough paraphrase. "It's much better than Babylon 5."

And she was right. For two months I lived in a weird parallel universe where B7 was on the TV all the time and the only people I had to share the experience with were my mildly bemused husband and my friend at work, who got enthusiastic ravings when I returned the videos. Most of the episodes I watched two or three times--sometimes I got up before work to watch one because I wanted to see it again but I also wanted to give the tape back so I could watch another. Amazingly, twenty years after they had first aired, I had no idea of what happened at the end.

I don't know if you've seen the end of the fifth series of 'Babylon 5', but it's really quite sad. I usually have a little sniffle as Delenn and Sheridan say their goodbyes and he goes to his eternal reward. If I had to pick a single word to describe it, I would say 'touching'.

The end of Blake's 7 is not at all like that.

I couldn't believe it. I  _really_  couldn't believe it. I think it's the suddenness with which it happens; no warning, no telegraphing. As the Crew started to go down I temporarily lost the ability to breathe. As the final credits finished rolling I was still curled up on the sofa whimpering "No, no no no, nononononono!" My husband had progressed from mildly bemused to fearing for my sanity.

"It's just a TV programme," he said.

My reply is not printable on a family web site.

Three years passed. I went to Deliverance '98, my first ever con of any kind. I bought my own set of videos (and one day I'll even watch "Blake" again). I started to read fanfic on the web. And this year I started to try and write my own. I've finished 14 stories so far, of which 2 are PGP and one finishes with GP. I also have a 5th Series work-in-progress, written in transcript format.

So, from my extensive four months of writing experience, why do I write PGP stories?

1\. Fascination. GP is the emotional high point of the series, and follows "Warlord," one of the other episodes with real kick--the failure of the alliance and the loss of Xenon base. There is a lot of 'juice' in the scenario and with how any survivors deal with what has happened.

2\. Variety. PGP has the potential to be any kind of story possible. The last scene of "Blake" is the cliffhanger to end all cliffhangers. I love happy endings. I also love angst. Of my two completed PGP stories to date, one has all the Scorpio crew survive the GP shooting and ends with Avon and Tarrant riding of into the sunset together. The other has all the crew except Avon die on GP, and  _he_  is executed by Blake's rebels at the end of the story. There are a lot of points in between I haven't covered yet.

3\. Freedom. There is no canonical 'what happened after' to worry about. Alternative universes are fun, but they lose some of the potential of the series if they diverge too early in canon. One of the tremendous advantages of writing B7 fanfic is that the reader has 52 episodes of character development to draw on. PGP is the ultimate alternate universe, because it can incorporate everything that has gone before and still go in any direction the writer wishes. Anyone can live, anyone can die. I love to read other people's ideas about what  _might_  have happened.

4\. I want  _more_. I want to know what happened next, even if that's nothing more than knowing how they were buried. 52 episodes is simply not enough. Chris Boucher is on record as saying that any of the Crew except Blake could have survived, and that's justification enough for me.


End file.
